Monday, May 16, 2016

Twitter Thoughts—April 2016 Week 3

Featuring the films and show:

The Jungle Book (2016) ***½

Brooklyn Nine-Nine, season 3
(23 23-min. eps. 2015-2016) ****

Avengers: Age of Ultron
(2015) ***½

Can’t Stop the Music (1980)
no stars

Ah man! I have fallen behind
again. This site has gone into the crapper, but I’m doing it, man. I’m blaming the two year old. If I have any
readers left, you’re just going to have to hang with me until he’s… I don’t
know… 12? Anyway, These were the non-Ebertfest movies I watched and a TV season
I finished during the two weeks I was watching the Ebertfest films.

I thought the latest live
action adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book” was quite impressive.
I really wasn’t sure what to think going into it. I didn’t think it looked good
from the trailers, but the early buzz was that it was great. I loved the Disney
animated version and just didn’t know what to think about seemingly live action
animals talking. It’s the lowest form of family filmmaking.

I was struck while watching
these animals talk to each other as if it’s actually something that happens in
nature that CGI has come so far that it’s wrong to look at a movie like this as
a live action movie. This is an animated movie, almost entirely. It uses actual
live action elements with the frequency and artistry of the cartoon elements of
the original “Pete’s Dragon”, another live action animated update coming from
Disney this fall. But it’s the live element that is really foreign here and
needs to be assimilated to the CGI we’re seeing, which has become just as
dramatically artistic as hand drawn animated movies once were. The CGI here is
remarkable.

More importantly, director Jon
Favreau proves himself to be a master of the action format. This is not because
he puts together a great many incredible action sequences here, which he does,
but because he works in so much character and story development around them and
everything so naturally works together. It doesn’t feel like
exposition/action/character development/action/background with
foreshadowing/action. It all flows in and out of each movement naturally and
you almost don’t even realize you’ve found yourself in an action sequence until
you realize that you’re grasping your arm rests a little tighter than you had been
ten minutes earlier.

The underrated television police
comedy “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” wrapped up its third season fairly quietly and
little earlier than most of the full-length season shows. While I cooled on
this show slightly during it’s second season, the third really impressed me.
What might’ve originally been seen as an Andy Samberg vehicle to launch him out
of his SNL days has really become completely an ensemble comedy, even to the
point where guest stars seem greatly steeped into the ensemble of the show. I
especially liked Jason Mantzoukas’s three-episode arc as a long time undercover
cop who has difficulty assimilating back into normal life after a years long
assignment in the mob. I so want his character to be added to the cast as a
regular next season. They probably don’t have the money for such a move without
losing another regular, and I can’t imagine whom this show can do without.

I rewatched “Avengers: Age of
Ultron” for the first time since seeing it opening day last year to prepare for
the opening of “Captain America: Civil War”. I liked it better this time
around, which probably has more to do with being better entrenched in the
Marvel Cinematic Universe this year than last than the movie actually being
better than I initially felt it was. You can read my original review here. The
MCU definitely benefits from multiple viewings because there is so much going
on and the filmmakers have so much new information to launch out there with
every subsequent movie. If you’re willing to put in the time for Marvel, it can
be more rewarding than just viewing the films in a more casual nature.

Finally, thanks to my
allegiance to the podcast “How Did This Get Made?” I was fortunate enough to
inflict upon myself the Village People origin story movie “Can’t Stop the
Music”, which is indeed a gloriously terrible movie. It’s so bad that it’s
subject, the Village People, are relegated to supporting roles, and not ones
big enough to be considered necessary to the plot. How do you make a movie
about a group of people that isn’t about them? And I haven’t even mentioned
Caitlyn Jenner’s involvement yet. So, I’ve done that with my life now.

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About Me

Andrew D. WellsAndrew is a professionally trained actor and stage director. He was a reporter for the daily newspaper The Marshall Democrat-News. He has been critiquing film since Mr. Lucas released the first of his "Star Wars" prequels in 1999. His reviews can also be seen atMarshall Democrat-News